


Mirage

by anneapocalypse



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: F/F, Rescue, Sierra Madre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-22
Updated: 2014-02-22
Packaged: 2018-01-13 10:29:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1222963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anneapocalypse/pseuds/anneapocalypse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Veronica learns who the courier found at the Sierra Madre, there's only one thing she can do. Written for a prompt from <a href="http://theivorytowercrumbles.tumblr.com">theivorytowercrumbles</a> on tumblr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirage

Veronica Santangelo is going to die.

She has some time to think before she dies, but what to think about. How the courier, the woman she’d come to trust, didn’t think to mention until weeks after her return, and in passing, that she’d found Chris at the Sierra Madre. How she’d refused to take Veronica back. How foolish it was to try to make the journey alone, how the courier had outright begged her not to go, said it was dangerous and she didn’t even know the way well herself, how…

(How could she have done anything else?)

The maps helped, though not as much as she hoped. The courier was loathe to part with her Pip-Boy data, and only after Veronica said she was going and her companion could either help or not, did she with extreme reluctance transfer the data to a holodisk and hand it over.

“Veronica,” she said quietly, one last time, “please don’t do it.”

“You can come with me,” Veronica said, knowing full well she wouldn’t.

The courier shuddered, drew a breath and let it out again. “I can’t go back there.”

That alone should’ve been a deterrent, but it wasn’t.

“Thank you,” Veronica said, trying to break the tension.

The courier cursed under her breath, and turned away. “Don’t fuckin’ thank me. I probably just handed you a death sentence.”

There’s no way the hazy outline of a tower in the distance is real. She wants it to be, wants that with a terrible aching hope that still clings deep in her chest and refuses to let go. But there have been too many wavering, uncertain visions in the desert heat in the past few days for her trust any impression that emerges from the bloody skyline.

And now, her water is gone, the last drops tipped down her dry throat before she curled up in the shade of a rock outcropping to wait out the heat of the day. Sleep isn’t coming. If she doesn’t have long, maybe it’s not so bad to spend it awake, but the thoughts that crowd her mind give her little comfort.

It isn’t real, it isn’t real.

But if only she could get a little closer and be sure.

She wakes to the howling of nightstalkers. A long way off, thank goodness. The further she’s ventured into the desert, the fewer creatures she’s seen. It’s eerie how bare and still the landscape grows. Plant life, too, has diminished. She didn’t anticipate this. Even a single agave or prickly pear plant could keep her going long enough to reach the Sierra Madre… maybe. She doesn’t have a Pip-Boy, can’t track her exact location. But she’s followed the maps, as best she could…

She unrolls herself stiffly from her cover against the rock. The thirst is already growing painful, her throat tight and parched. But the cool of night is descending over the desert, and with that reprieve, she might be able to make it just a little further.

When she wakes again, she is somewhere else

somewhere she doesn’t know

she doesn’t remember falling asleep

she doesn’t remember stopping

she doesn’t remember

the voice

“Veronica.”

It’s the courier. Trying to stop her from leaving. No. She left. Crossed the desert. Fell in the sand. Ran out of water. Saw a tower in the distance. Not real.

“Veronica.”

Not real. Not the courier’s voice. Familiar? Familiar like something heard on the radio long ago.

“Veronica?”

She’s indoors, and it’s warm. Not beating-sun hot, not nighttime cold. There’s a ceiling. A dim room. One low lamp on a desk in the corner, spreading a soft yellow glow. And warm hands helping her sit up, bringing a bottle to her lips. Her eyes close again as she swallows and for a long moment nothing is as real as water. It’s room temperature, but clean and nothing has ever felt better poured down her throat.

“Not too much,” the voice cautions. “Little at a time, so you can keep it down.”

Her eyes focus closer now, and it can’t be real, because the voice doesn’t fit. This is a vision and she is facedown in the sand and her dying brain is throwing flashes, things she remembers from long ago, voices from the radio melded to the stuff of nightmares, thin clean scars spanning a face from brow to cheekbone, cheek to jaw. But the eyes. The nose. The lips. Clearer than memory. As real as the taste of water.

“Chris,” Veronica whispers. It comes out a rasp. She clears her throat and tries again. “Chris.”

The voice is still wrong, and the scars are real, and her brown hair is gone, but it’s her.

Only Chris’s eyes would look at her that way.

Christine sets the water bottle aside, and sits on the edge of what Veronica’s suddenly aware is a bed, the bed she’s in. Chris must’ve gotten her undressed, Veronica realizes, because she’s out of her recon suit, dressed in some clean fatigues and a tank top that hangs just a little too big on her. She can tell, even before running her fingers over the soft worn fabric, that it’s Christine’s size. Though her helmet’s been removed, her hair’s wrapped neatly in a scarf, tied by hands not her own.

“Why did you come here?”

Veronica shakes her head slightly. “You sound… different.”

“Oh.” Chris’s brown eyes register understanding. She touches her throat, where Veronica can make out another scar. “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you about it later.” She doesn’t smile. There’s something tense, guarded in her movements. “Why did you come?”

“Are we… is this the Sierra Madre?” The last thing she remembers is the desert at night. She didn’t come. She never made it here.

Chris’s eyes narrow. “Why did you come here?”

“I was looking for _you,_ ” Veronica blurts out, baffled by the persistence of the question because why else, and this isn’t the way it was supposed to go, finding her again, and it feels like she’s done something wrong, something beyond running out of water and collapsing in the desert in the dead of night as she must’ve done. But Christine’s expression softens at her reply, just a little.

“That’s all?”

“What do you mean, that’s _all?_ ” Veronica shoves aside the sheet covering her legs and pulls them up under her, leaning forward.

“I mean, you didn’t come treasure-hunting?” Christine studies her intently. “Or for _him_.”

“For who?”

Christine lets her breath out very slowly. “Elijah,” she says, almost reluctantly.

“Wait--Father Elijah?” Veronica reaches for the water again. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”

Christine’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise, but some more of the tension leaves her shoulders at that. “Yes.” She falls into an abrupt silence, and her eyes break away.

Veronica reaches for her hand. There’s a story to all of this, much more than the courier told her, she’s sure, but right now it’s hard to think of that when Chris, her Chris, is right here. The shock of contact brings Chris’s gaze back. “I came for you,” Veronica says again. That may not be the right thing to say either, but it seems to alleviate whatever’s troubling Christine. “At least, I was trying to.”

Christine’s fingers curl around hers.

“You got close,” she says, after a moment. “The casino’s security system monitors the surrounding area. It picked up your heat signature.” She runs her thumb over Veronica’s knuckles, studying her hands as if to memorize them. “I used to try to warn treasure hunters away… of course, that only makes them more determined to get in. I can get them through the Villa safely, at least, and there’s plenty left in the casino to get them resupplied for the journey home.” She’s quiet for the moment. “I make the offer. If they still insist on going after the treasure… well, they’re on their own. There aren’t many, though. Maybe one every couple of months. If this place were easy to find, Elijah wouldn’t have had to resort to kidnapping.”

Veronica nods slowly, thinking of the courier.

Christine eyes her quizzically. “You don’t seem surprised by what I’m saying.”

Veronica returns a wry smile. “I guess we have a lot to catch up on.“

Christine nods. “I guess we do.”

 


End file.
